How to survive scandals?

One of the most important tools to reduce the impact of political scandals has been state advertisements. The state's use of media through advertisements has begun to have a greater impact, especially with the increasing use of social media. Through advertisements, the impact of the scandal is tried to be reduced by diverting the public's attention away from the scandals and towards the work that has already been done or is planned to be done in the future. In this process, the two main factors that states pay attention to when broadcasting advertisements are timing and the message it contains. The aim of the advertisements made after the spreading scandal is to give the public the good news of good things to be done, with the message they contain, rather than appearing to cover up the incident.

For example, when the impact of corruption allegations on voting preferences in the US House of Representatives congressional elections was examined, it was seen that there was a decrease between 5% and 11% in the votes of candidates accused of corruption, and this decrease was greater for candidates who were members of the party in power at the time. This rate, which shows the amount of decrease in votes, also varied depending on the impact of corruption allegations on the media, that is, bigger scandals attracted more attention in the media. Considering the findings in the examined period between 1982 and 1990, it was seen that although there was a decrease in the voting rates, this situation did not cause electoral defeat. This actually shows that, despite the scandalous effect, there are many factors affecting the use of media and voter behavior (Hibbing).

Another important point to mention in this regard is the advertising budget. Parties or politicians who can allocate more budget to advertising expenditures can reduce the power of the claims made about them more and more effectively because they have the capacity to prepare potentially more effective and larger advertisements. When the relationship between government advertisements and media coverage of corruption scandals in Argentina was examined, findings supporting this situation were observed. In this study, it was found that government advertising expenditures reduced the rate of scandal news appearing on the front page of newspapers by 23%. The negative correlation here shows how big an impact the government's advertising spending power has on the media. In addition, it is obvious that this situation will also affect the independence of the media, causing violations of rules such as transparency and breaking public trust over time (Franceschelli).

It is possible to examine the effects of scandals in two different categories: immediate and permanent effects. Although it had an immediate negative effect when everyone talked about it intensely when the scandal first emerged, it has been observed that the effect of this situation decreased over time among those who supported the candidate about whom the scandal allegation was made (Nyhan). This actually shows the role of the state in controlling the media through advertisements, which we see in the decisions of both the US House of Representatives and the Argentine Government. Advertising planning by states has created an important problem both in order to alleviate the immediate effects of scandals and to prevent the allegations from causing a permanent effect in the long term (Vonnahme).

Another factor that determines the effects and duration of scandals is institutions. While governments create advertisements, the support of financial institutions after scandals occur reduces the time it takes for politicians to recover from the effects of scandals. Partisan support is as important as the support of institutions because candidates or parties with more partisan support are more likely to survive the effects of scandals. A study conducted on political scandals involving US presidents and governors between 1972 and 2011 found that presidents with more partisan allies were approximately 10% less likely to have a scandal about them (Rottinghaus).

The type of scandals also varies in their impact. For example, the impact of financial scandals passes more quickly than scandals involving moral or ethical violations (Nyhan). Sexual misconduct or good deeds done just to show off to the public are remembered by people for a longer period of time, and advertising is less effective in covering up these scandals. To counteract the impact of a scandal, politicians usually first deny it, deny the situation, then try to deflect the incident (either use advertising to divert attention to another issue or present the reality of the incident to the public in a different way), or acknowledge the scandal and apologize. The behavior that plays the biggest role in reducing the long-term impact of scandals is to accept the scandal if it is true and take responsibility, because such an honest approach is appreciated by the public. On the other hand, denial and distortion of the incident may alleviate the immediate impact of the scandal in the short term, but in the ongoing process, if additional statements and allegations come from the opposition party about the incident, the situation tends to get worse (Solaz).

References:

Franceschelli, Rafael Di Tella and Ignacio. “Government Advertising and Media Coverage of Corruption Scandals.” AMERICAN ECONOMIC JOURNAL: APPLIED ECONOMICS 3 (2011).

Hibbing, Susan Welch and John R. “The Effects of Charges of Corruption on Voting Behavior in Congressional Elections 1982-1990.” The University of Chicago Press on behalf of the Southern Political Science Association (1997): 226-239.

Nyhan, Brendan. “Scandal Potential: How Political Context and News Congestion Affect the President's Vulnerability to Media Scandal.” Cambridge University Press (2014).

Rottinghaus, Brandon. “Do Scandals Matter?” Political Research Quarterly 76 (2023): 1932-1943.

Solaz, Catherine De Vries and Hector. “The Electoral Consequences of Corruption.” Annual Review of Political Science (2017): 391-408.

Vonnahme, Beth Miller. “Surviving scandal: An exploration of the immediate and lasting effects of scandal on candidate evaluation.” Social Science Quarterly (2014).